Volvo Working with Imperial College to Create Cars with Bodies Made from Batteries

Electric cars, as well as other vehicles featuring renewable energy and eco-friendly statistics, may be the perfect fit for some out there, but for car manufacturers, there’s still one problem: the size and weight of the battery therein. While companies try to figure out how to make the battery lighter and smaller, yet still produce the same amount of energy as they do now (if not more), it looks like Volvo, working with the Imperial College in London, has other plans. Like to create future vehicles that have the battery part of the body of the car.

Volvo and Imperial College announced recently their plans to create future cars with the batteries built right into the body of the vehicles. By dispersing the battery throughout the car, it is reported that the weight of vehicles could be reduced by upwards of 15 percent. The new technology is a composite blend, created from carbon fibers, and a polymer resin. The result, is that the combination warrants the ability to not only store energy, but also charge it.

Volvo points out that this idea, while still a long ways off from seeing commercial success, can both charge and store energy faster than the current generation of batteries employed in electric vehicles all over the world. What’s better, though, is the fact that the material Volvo and Imperial College are testing this brand new combination from, can be molded into different shapes, and still be strong enough to, say, be the body of a car. Research has been on-going for awhile now, and it is expected to continue for the next three years. Additional funding for the endeavor is being ponied up by the European Union.